4.07.2014

its so hard to say goodbye

This blog is called Dexter Morgan's Mama after Dex, but we also have two kittens we love to hate and hate to love.

Well two weeks ago today we lost part of our family. Mr. Tiger Wiger aka Buttface passed away.

I've had Tiger since I was 20 years old. He lived a great 12 years with lots of food, treats, and cat nip. oh how we bought catnip for this guy.

Tiger was left with me by a former roommate who moved out who split up with her boy-friend (who bought him) and just moved out. I had tried several times (unsuccessfully) to contact her. I didn't mind having Tiger around and the best thing was Sylvester (who we still have) got along.

I've had a really hard time with the loss of Tiger. It was pretty unexpected. Since animals can't tell you when somethings wrong makes it even more difficult. For a couple weeks before he passed, Tiger started to look like a walking balloon. I was starting to sense that something was wrong with him. Of course I jumped on Google to see what could be going on, most of the stuff I read about was how it could be something wrong with his liver, or liver enzymes. I was reading all of this on a Sunday and the vet was closed. I called the vet the next thing on Monday morning and they said the cat needed to come in immediately-based on the symptoms I was telling them. Ry-guy left work and took Tiger in. They told us that he was having the issue we had read about on-line and that he was anemic. We had no idea that he was anemic, because he was eating, drinking, peeing and pooping just fine the bigger problem was that he wasn't getting any of the nutrients from eating and drinking-his gums were white-bright white, which isn't a good thing. The vet told us we could try to do some treatment which would help temporary but they couldn't guarantee that it would help him live longer. We had to make the choice to spend thousands of dollars or just accept the fact that it was his time to go. After all day at work crying and taking to my mom and his mom and some co-workers we decided it was best to put him down.

This is by far the hardest thing I've had to do in life as of now. I'm crying as I type. The hardest part is watching Sylvester look for his buddy, or cry and cry all night long. Its still hard for me to come home because the house feels "empty". I have moments doing everyday things where I just break down and cry. I often wonder if we made the right choice. I know in the long run we did. Many times people try to hold on to a pet for selfish reasons even if the pet could be in pain, just because we don't want to say "goodbye".

Many of you reading this might not know that we even had cats. But we did, and now we have one, and Dex, and we plan to love on them even more than we did before.

ugh, for sure tearing up/crying reading this. It may be unrealistic but I hope to god TJ passes away (never) in his sleep someday because I know having to make that decision will kill me. I can't fathom BEING there for it happening, but I also can't fathom NOT being there. I hope we have many years before we have to make that call.. but I just know I'm going to be a wreck. So so sorry for your loss.

My cat growing up lived to be 21. I had to come home from college and go with my mom to put her down. My mom just could not do it alone and I needed to say goodbye to Ginger myself. Honestly, it was one of the hardest things but you know that he's in a much better place. I am so sorry for your loss, Jen!